21st Century College English: Book 2

21st Century College English: Book 2 Unit 3 : Part B

Unit Three: Part B • Review of Text A • Text B • Listening Practice • Assignment

Revision of Text A 1.Dictation 2.Assignment Checkup •Cloze Ex. VIII • Translation Ex. X

Dictation Dictation! You are going to hear 5 sentences. Each will be read three times. Write down the sentences according to the dictation. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Check-up

Dictation Key to Dictation: 1. Engineers throughout the company appreciated George’s expertise and his friendly and capable help. 2. Faced with the threat of an unwilling departure from Japan, George reinvented himself as a “cultural translator”. 3. At times something far more important than good English was needed. 4. Somehow or other, he made their messages sound at least halfway sensible to Americans. 5. Whole multitudes of difficulties never arose thanks to George’s skill at smoothing over small conflicts before they became big, emotional and costly.

Cloze From each of the pairs listed on the right, choose the word that best fills each blank. 《读写教程 II》:Ex. VIII, p. 66

Cloze The biggest problem that “cultural translators” have to solve is caused by very subtle cultural differences. _____ the most troublesome cultural _____ that international joint ventures have to cope with is the process by which decisions are _____. The biggest difficulty is simply _____ that decision-making is a cultural issue. _____ very few people are actually _____ the decision-making norms that those norms are far from universal. • Among / Amid • contracts / conflicts • made / done • understand / understanding • Due to / Since • awakened to / conscious of Among conflicts made understanding Since conscious of

Cloze _____ when they _____ a different decision-making style they become first confused, then impatient _____ the other parties’ “inability” to make a decision. “What’s wrong with them — are they _____ or just stupid?!” The next phase is most often a determination to each the other side “the right way” to make a decision — _____, their way. So run into 7. So / Then 8. run into / enter 9. by / with 10. crazy / capable 11. by name / that is with crazy that is

Cloze But _____ the other side (whoever it is) feels exactly the same way about their “right way”, the results of this teaching effort are usually profoundly non-educational. _____ when the situation becomes truly ugly, _____ into a total cultural war in which both _____ accuse the other side of incompetence and non-cooperation. since 12. since / whereas 13. That’s / There’s 14. escalated / escalating 15. personnel / parties That’s escalating parties

Translation 《读写教程 II》:Ex. X, p. 67

Translation 1.当那份临时性的工作结束时，人家给乔治提供了一份永久性的（permanent）工作，他马上就接受了。 come to an end be offered When the temporary job came to an end , George was offered a permanent job, which he accepted at once.

Translation 2.为了确保他们在日本的合资企业赢利，那些美国公司比之语言翻译来说更需要文化翻译。 profitable even more than ensure To ensure that their joint ventures in Japan are profitable, the American companies need cultural translators even more than language translator.

Translation 3.作为一名文化翻译，乔治渴望帮助那些就许许多多事情来向他求助的日方雇员，包括属于他专业知识范围之内和之外的问题。 be eager to help his field of expertise came to ask his advice on As a cultural translator, George was eager to help the Japanese employees who came to ask his advice on a great many matters, both within and outside his field of expertise.

Translation 4. 乔治用某种方法说服美方经理接受了日方会计师的决定，从而缓解了两人之间的冲突。 go along with somehow or other smooth over Somehow or other, George persuaded the American manager to go along with the Japanese accountant’s decision, thus smoothing over the conflict between the two.

Translation 5. 美方经理与日方经理之间的确有时会发生冲突和争论。但由于双方都很有见识进行妥协，才防止了这些冲突和争论激化为感情大战。 arise escalate into have the good sense Conflicts and arguments do arise at times between the American managers and their Japanese counterparts. But since both parties have the good sense to compromise, these conflicts are prevented from escalating into big emotional battles.

Translation 6. 所有的日方雇员，包括人事经理在内，都很感激乔治在他们遇到的众多问题上所给予的经常帮助。 the multitude of run into All the Japanese employees, the personnel manager included, appreciated George’s frequent help with the multitude of problems they ran into.

Translation 7. 我的日语还不足以很好地表达我的思想，所以如果我有时说了些愚蠢的话，请不要生气。 express myself not enough to get offended My spoken Japanese is not good enough to express myself well. Please don’t get offended if I sometimes say stupid things.

Translation 8. 张大夫对中医有精深的了解，英语也掌握得不错，所以他完全有资格培训前来中国学习中医的外国医生。 a solid understanding be highly qualified a good mastery of English With a solid understanding of traditional Chinese medicine and a good mastery of English, Dr. Zhang is highly qualified to train foreign doctors who have come to China to study Chinese medicine.

Text B • Reading Skill • Understanding Idiomatic Expressions • Intensive Study • Difficult Sentences • Key words and phrases • Text-related Information • Comprehension Check

Reading Skill Understanding Idiomatic Expressions The meaning of idiomatic expressions can be very hard to guess. Word formation clues don’t always help, and can even mislead us entirely! But effective readers don’t give up on the first try. They keep reading, in search of context clues – examples, explanations, contrasts or parallel phrases – that can help them figure out the meaning of idiomatic expressions.

Reading Skill Understanding Idiomatic Expressions XIII. Practice your skills at hypothesizing the meanings of some new words and idiomatic expressions before you read Text B. Match the words and expressions listed on the left with the best definitions on the right and hypothesize what the words and expressions probably mean. Then scan the article until you locate each word or phrase, and look for context clues to check your hypothesis. 《读写教程 II》:Ex. XIII, p. 69

Reading Skill 1) be turned off by sb. / sth. 2) chances are 3) forge 4) crucial 5) wind up doing 6) probe J) dislike sth., be offended by sth. G) probably K) create by hard work D) vital, critical I) do in the end, after hesitation, discussion, etc. B) investigate or examine very thoroughly

Reading Skill 7) make the call 8) fall for sth. 9) like a bull in a china shop 10) at that 11) right and left 12) swallow one’s pride C) make the decision A) be fooled by sb./ sth. F) causing a lot of troubles, damages, etc. H) too E) in every situation, at every opportunity L) accept humiliation

Text B A Multicultural person Gunnar Beeth 1A multicultural person is someone who is deeply convinced that all cultures are equally good, enjoys learning the rich variety of cultures in the world, and most likely has been exposed to more than one culture in his or her lifetime. 2You cannot motivate anyone, especially someone of another culture, until that person has accepted you. A multilingual salesperson can explain the advantages of a product in other languages, but a multicultural salesperson can motivate foreigners to buy it. That’s a critical difference.

Text B 3 No one likes foreigners who are arrogant about their own culture. Customers are turned off by monocultural salespeople. The trouble is, most people are arrogantly monocultural without being aware of it. And even those who are aware of it can’t hide it. Foreigners sense monocultural arrogance at once and set up their own cultural barriers, effectively blocking any attempt by the monocultural person to motivate them. 4 Multiculturalism is a requirement that has been neglected too often in hiring managers for international positions. And this neglect is affecting every industry. Even if your company is not (yet!) a multinational one,chances are you’re in touch with foreign customers or manufacturers. Do you have the right employee forging these relations ?

Text B 5 For 20-odd years, I’ve run an executive-search firm from Brussels. When clients ask us to find the right person for a new pan-European sales or management position, I start by asking them to specify the qualifications their ideal candidate would have. Most often they list the same qualities they would want for a domestic position, but with the additional requirement that the new manager be fluent enough in English, German and French to cope with faxes and email. It sometimes takes me hours to persuade clients that the linguistic abilities they see as crucial are not enough. But after some discussion, we usually wind up specifying something like: “The new manager must be accepted throughout Europe. Thus, he or she must be multicultural. If possible, he or she should also be able tocommunicate in more than one of the major European languages.”

Text B 6Of course, it’s far more difficult to determine candidates’ multiculturalism than it is to check their language skills — but it’s also a far more important ingredient to success. To seek out this crucial quality, I ask a lot of questions about candidates’ early childhood, looking for evidence of contact with diverse cultures. And I probe for arrogance about their background and environment.

Text B 7 It’s sometimes very difficult to make the call. I remember a company that asked me to check out a salesman they were planning to send to Mexico. He’d studied Spanish, and had grown up in New York City — the most culturally diverse place in America. But when I interviewed him, it turned out that he had no concept of the great pride Mexicans take in their culture, and moreover he was uneasy about Mexican restaurants and markets being dirty and unsafe. I rejected him — just as Mexican buyers would have rejected him if he’d been selected for the job.

Text B 8Similarly, don’t think for a moment that a proven American salesperson can be sent to Great Britain and be expected to sell there, since it’s the same language. In nine out of ten cases, he or she will fail. The ones who succeed are multicultural people with the rare ability to gain acceptance from British customers.

Text B 9And don’t fall for the myth that a candidate’s knowledge of superficial behavior like shaking hands or bowing is a sure sign of multiculturalism. An American businessman arriving in Japan is immediately aware of the cultural differences, even in the first hour. It only takes a few days to learn when to take off his shoes or how to eat with chopsticks — but he’ll still feel like a bull in a china shop — and an exceptionally clumsy bull at that. Even moving as carefully as he can, he still finds himself sending all the china crashing to the floor and offending people right and left. A monocultural person gives up at this point, because even if he’s ready to learn about another culture intellectually, he refuses to penetrate it emotionally. A multicultural person swallows his pride, learns from hisblunders and in the end manages to get in touch with the spirit of the new culture, not just its superficial details.

… and most likely has beenexposed to more than one culture in his or her lifetime. — have direct experience of life in different cultural contexts

You cannot motivate anyone, especially someone of another culture, until that person has accepted you. Paraphrase ? — Without understanding someone, esp. someone of another culture, and making him/her feel that you are one of them, you can not convince him/her to do anything (such as purchase a product or participate in a business deal).

…, chances are you’re in touch with foreign customers or manufacturers. Paraphrase ? — …, it is very likely that you do business with foreigners.

seek out — try to find (sb. or sth.) by search • e.g. • It took me several weeks to seek out the reference material that I needed for my paper. • How can we seek out a really good person for the job?

And I probe for arrogance about their background and environment. Paraphrase ? — And I investigate thoroughly to find out if they are arrogant about their own culture.

make the call — make the decision call n. — a decision made by referee, umpire, etc. in a sports match

not for a moment — not at all • e.g. • I didn’t believe for a moment that he was an actor. • I never suspected for a moment that you were married.

nine out of ten cases — in most cases; very likely “Out of” can be used to indicate what proportion of a group of things something is true of. For example, if something is true of one out of five things, it is true of one fifth of all things of that kind.

fall for — be attracted to; be tricked by • e.g. • Doug was too clever to fall for a story like that. • Don’t fall for that old trick; he’s trying to persuade you to buy his goods.

at that — besides; in addition • e.g. • It was a long wait, and an exasperating one at that. • It’s a new idea, and a good one at that.

swallow one’s pride — bring one’s pride under control; forget one’s pride and do sth. that seems necessary, although one does not want to do it • e.g. • After Bill lost the race he had to swallow his pride and shook hands with the winner. • If you want him back you’ll have to swallow your pride and say sorry.

Comprehension Check 1.The author begins his article with _____. A) one side of an argument B) a specific example C) the definition of an unusual term 1.The author begins his article with _____. A) one side of an argument B) a specific example C) the definition of an unusual term 《读写教程 II》:Ex. XIII, p. 75

Comprehension Check 2.The article was written for _____. A) personnel managers of companies that have contacts abroad B) non-Europeans hoping to be hired as salespeople C) clients of international joint venture 2.The article was written for _____. A) personnel managers of companies that have contacts abroad B) non-Europeans hoping to be hired as salespeople C) clients of international joint venture

Comprehension Check 3.In Paragraph 3, the author mainly discusses _____. A) the difference between a multilingual salesperson and multicultural one B) bad behavior foreigners display to visitors C) why monocultural salespeople are ineffective in doing business abroad 3.In Paragraph 3, the author mainly discusses _____. A) the difference between a multilingual salesperson and multicultural one B) bad behavior foreigners display to visitors C) why monocultural salespeople are ineffective in doing business abroad

Comprehension Check 4.The author has learned from his own experience that _____. A) not enough companies understand the importance of multiculturalism in hiring managers for international positions B) many companies think an excellent salesperson who also has a good command of foreign languages is the ideal candidate to represent them abroad C) both A and B 4.The author has learned from his own experience that _____. A) not enough companies understand the importance of multiculturalism in hiring managers for international positions B) many companies think an excellent salesperson who also has a good command of foreign languages is the ideal candidate to represent them abroad C) both A and B

Comprehension Check 5.“The clients” referred to in Paragraph 5 are _____. A) companies involved in international business B) candidates for management positions at multinational companies C) applicants for international business 5.“The clients” referred to in Paragraph 5 are _____. A) companies involved in international business B) candidates for management positions at multinational companies C) applicants for international business

Comprehension Check 6.The story of the candidate for a position in Mexico is meant to illustrate _____. A) how hard it can be to recognize monoculturalism B) why North American salespeople are rejected in Mexico C) methods managers can use to probe candidates 6.The story of the candidate for a position in Mexico is meant to illustrate _____. A) how hard it can be to recognize monoculturalism B) why North American salespeople are rejected in Mexico C) methods managers can use to probe candidates

Comprehension Check 7.In the last paragraph, the author intends to tell us that _____. A) it is very easy for an experienced businessperson to notice cultural differences when traveling abroad B) true adaptation to a new culture is not a quick or easy process C) foreigners have too much trouble adapting to Japanese culture 7.In the last paragraph, the author intends to tell us that _____. A) it is very easy for an experienced businessperson to notice cultural differences when traveling abroad B) true adaptation to a new culture is not a quick or easy process C) foreigners have too much trouble adapting to Japanese culture

Listening Practice Short Conversations Listening and Speaking Conversations Part 5.3, pp. 45~46 You will hear 10 short conversations. After each conversation you will hear a question. Listen carefully and choose the best answer from the four choices given.

Listening Practice: Conversations 1. A. He doesn’t believe the woman. B. He thinks that Willy was right to do so. C. He doesn’t feel sorry for Willy. D. He thinks the bananas should be good for Willy.

21st Century College English: Book 2